[color=gold][center][h2][i][b]Productive and Industrious[/b][/i][/h2][/center][/color]

[b]Soundtrack: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvXjYMt7EL8]Icarus- October[/url]
[/b]


In each factory, prep for Monaco, after unpacking the spaceplanes was near immediate. Formula AG had weeks to go till the Season Break, and until then, the teams were in full force.

Everything from product design to part production was covered. The sketches in holographic aperture, to then the process of milling it via 3D printers, or via raw materials, and then sculpting it into perfection, a cut across all the teams displaying advancements, modifications and changes to come. A montage of engineers, doctors, designers, and everything inbetween, getting to high tech, cutting edge racing performance.

From Valkyrie’s new chassis, built in an even more strictly enforced cleanroom, where it then got sprayed in the new colours for the team, to then the attachment of parts. Pilots going through changes to the neural link with the new parts, like getting used to a new limb, the factories and design centres, alongside associated CFD and wind tunnels, bit by bit, the hives of each of the team’s factories, associated campuses, engineers, bots, pilots, piece by piece, bit by bit, came together. From sim sessions, to neural tweaks, the world kept turning after a horrific crash. The clocks ticked, as the forces that acted behind the scenes assembled the ships for the next race to come. The one that required the opposite of Monaco's problems, where friction was back but the corners demanded all of it for rotating the ships through them.

And for Nora, it would be a new dawn. Waking up with new limbs, and getting used to movement, let alone the concept of racing again. But as they said in the 1980s, they had the technology. And that they would to get her back in, if she desired it. Media was tight lipped on that one, but the press had gone a storm with the crash, and safety had been raised. FIAR had kicked up a stink, and vowed it would never happen again, not with repulsors and Earth-like gravity being a known factor. Monaco was a lower speed circuit, and the risks were controllable, manageable, and after the virtual Pilots Forum, had been given the go-ahead.

So everyone was preparing, and gearing up. Teams heading to Nice Airport and then shipping their goods on the French Riviera, towards the Jewel of the Mediterranean.

[hr]

[color=gold][center][h1][i][b]
GLAMOUR////RISK
[/b][/i][/h1][/center][/color]

[center]
[img]https://www.monaco-tribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/casino-de-monte-carlo-700x445-min.jpg[/img]
[/center]

[center]
[h1][b]
Casino de Monte-Carlo, Monaco
[/b]
[/h1]
[/center]

[center][h2][i][b]Dorian Pascal Hornfleur[/b][/i][/h2][/center]

[b]Soundtrack: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAN3FoqzsrI]Hybrid- Tunnel Vision[/url]
[/b]

The black bars widen, as Dorian clambered out of the 2014 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Blackbird framed in front of the Casino de Monte-Carlo, a nearly priceless car at this point, dressed up in a fine dark grey suit, with yellow stitching that just made the outer jacket pop a little, albeit was humble enough to not go all gaudy and be too much. 

“Welcome to Monaco. Glitz, glamour….and glory.” The voiceover is distinctly Dorian’s, with a French accent as a valet takes his keys, Dorian more the image of Bond, rather than Dorian Pascal Hornfleur, racing driver. But we’re in for this narrative. A fun little sideshow, as he walks in, the concentrated, opulent luxury of the Casino before him.

“The mission is simple. Win the biggest race of them all. With a ship that turns and does so with poise, faster than anything before it.” Dorian does not hide any indulgence in this. Oh, this is hints of spy thriller, because everything here bleeds it. The cameo, if you happened to spot it, was that of what appeared to be a certain actress from Raven in discussion with an enormous, hulking seven foot figure that even would have scared Kais who was a bouncer here, her look fierce but keeping the ruffians out. Apart from him, now on the floor.
Dorian walks through a small crowd, the camera catching the crowd to his side, at a roulette table, watching.

A croupier lays out chips, and the ball rolls inside a roulette wheel, the wheel spinning, spinning, spinning, the camera above it facing down at the wheel….

Revealing a 1960’s Lotus F1 roaring round the circuit at its own multi-spoked wheel, roaring through the unsafe, primitive Monaco circuit chasing after a Ferrari, cutting back into animation in a cel-shaded fashion as it fades out back to Dorian’s voice, and cutting through history in the various forms of animation of the glory days of Monaco.

“It is a glory reserved for few. And fewer repeat wins here. This is one of the Triple Crown, one of the most famous races in motorsport. To do well in Monaco is to be the ultimate pilot. Drivers like….Fangio. Senna. Schumacher. Hamilton. Starcross. Mulder. Lipponen.” 
Dorian found his place, namely, a Craps table, with dice already in play.
The dice roll, and in them, the reflection of the races before. Verstappen winning, then the glorious fight between Starcross and Lundstrom, and lastly, Amy taking the top step last year, as the dice clatter across the green in that fade. That clashed with her voice coming back.

“Stirling. You did not think it was that easy to stop me, did you?” Amy sat across the table from Dorian, wrapped up in a beautiful silver dress, absolutely framing her like the villain that she portrayed herself as, simply a siren out here and as unblemished, platinum hair just adding to that effect. She shovelled chips across the table, clattering twice with her metal nails at the end of her prosthetic hands. The chips fell, revealing Silver Apex’s logo, holographically growing. She was playing the villain.

“A bold call, Madame.” Dorian noted, as Amy shrugged, the lack of care acted phenomenally well, given she was experienced at it.

“Well, you wanted a game. Let’s have one, Monsieur Hornfleur. We appear to have the same mission.” Amy shot back, and Dorian with it shoved a big pile of his chips into the middle, with Valkyrie’s logo to boot across them. He smirked back and nodded to the croupier, looking back to Monaco. And with it, the montage of previous races coming back, as did his voice.

"Monaco is a different game to most. Here, it’s not just about speed….it's about style, precision, and knowing exactly when to make your move. Every turn here is a calculated risk, every lap a dance with danger…every overtake, an all in." Dorian’s voice replies as if back to the audience, charming as ever.

Senna’s Golden Lap in 1988, screaming with a V6 Hybrid taking more risks than humanly thought possible, to Starcross nailing it in the rain and pulling off three overtakes, to Dorian’s own triumph almost a decade ago, and then, Amy’s recent victory with a smashed up Valkyrie ship, badly hit with Cassie Neves herself last season sobbing as she clambered out, and then cut back to Florence Mason being thrown into the pool at Piscine, from her head-mounted camera, then dropping into the water, bubbles rushing up from her point of view and fading gently. As the music dropped back, the scene cut into the Casino table once more, and the look of Amy’s fierce response.

“Then let’s find out how far you’ll go.” Amy shot back, her metallic-carbon arms leaning on the table, head turned to the croupier with expectancy.

“No more bets, thank you.” The croupier with it threw the dice, and the scene cut back to the present day, burying the camera into black.

The scene shifts, panning slowly to the gleaming pit lane of the Monaco AGP. Under a canopy of neon reflections in the Monaco evening, the high-tech AG ships stand ready—a fusion of advanced carbon composite engineering, in each tiny bit box, which was interrupted by that iconic whine. Amy and Dorian's ships raced side by side towards Sainte Devote, and back up the hill, rushing past the Casino itself, no guardrails in place, blasting through the hairpin at Fairmont, and beyond the tunnel at Lavotto onto the glass/metal fusion of MAG tracking that sat right above the water, Dorian in the hunt for Amy, like some sort of chase from a thriller. 

Their craft, glowing under the moonlit sky on the Monaco circuit as if it was literally after the game of Craps, mirrored the duality of Monaco itself. A suave extravagance that just oozed history. The camera cuts to a wide shot of the circuit as they race through the tight section of La Rascasse, the shimmering Mediterranean as a backdrop under the moonlight. 

A contrast to the daytime race, but no less elegant, as the camera cut back in to the casino, the dice stopping in place on the table with the outcome unknown, but the camera pulled back from their reactions.

And across the room, leaning against a balcony looking down on it all, there was Helena Starcross herself, in her black dress, the 80 year-old, elder stateswoman of the sport. Her skin was remarkably well looked after, her look of someone who must have been 30 years younger than what some would have imagined. A lifetime of G-forces hadn’t ruined her charm, and she had refused to age. Medical technology at the right price, of course, ensured that without ruining her look entirely, she had many more years to go. A great-grandmother now, but still completely enjoying her little cameo in the sport.

“In Monaco, legends are made. This game is played with more than chips, those two fight, but it’s …more strategic than that. The race is set by the most important qualifying session of the year, where finding your state of mind matters more than anything else to find what cannot be found. Ultimate victory or heartbreaking failure….and win here, and your lap will echo in history. Winning here is like nowhere else.” Her voice sounded nearly regal, as she turned to the view outside, the harbour and the hover-yachts clashing against more traditional superyachts and old-school harbour buildings alongside state of the art, ultra-decadent design sitting next to it shimmering in the moonlight.

Welcome to Monaco indeed. In a world of reduced income inequality, with billionaires paying their taxes, the multi-billionaires wealth was a little more difficult to find. But it partied here, and it played on the tables of Casino Square.
“Time to see their hands.”

[hr]

[color=gold][center][h1][i][b]DELTΔ HYPER[/b][/i][/h1][/center][/color]

[color=gold][center][h2][i][b]Episode Seven: Roll of the Dice[/b][/i][/h2][/center][/color]

[hr]

[center][h1][b]
Round 7 of Formula Anti-Gravity
Thursday 1st June, 2094
Practice Day
Monaco AGP
Casino de Monte-Carlo, Monaco
2000 EST
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[img]https://www.monaco-tribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/casino-de-monte-carlo.jpg[/img]

[b]Soundtrack: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_u1eu6Lpds]Cream- Sunshine of your Love[/url]
[/b]

As if to repeat that scene again, the pilots were all inside the Casino just after sunset, the function decidedly more private, and exclusive, kept up to things. They’d all arrived in ultra-exclusive AG luxury cars or older luxuries, and it was almost a point of ritual process that you drove into Casino Square and left the valet the keys to whatever you had come in on, or at least, were given VIP treatment and driven here. Or, of course, you could cycle in, or do something else....after all, traditions were traditions, but you could always stay extravagant if you made it your own. 

Most races were of course, an elegant affair, but Monaco, that was something else. It felt like the Pilots were among Royalty, quite literally, and mingling at the most extravagant place that didn’t feel tacky or forced, like Dubai or Jordan. It felt like it couldn’t be more opposite to Luna and Silverstone at the same time, this circuit being so stepped in history and heritage that while it functionally produced poor ship-on-ship racing, it did produce magic for the sheer spectacle of how close the ships went to the barriers. From bankers to Nobel Prize winners, literal old aristocracy to legends of the scene, quite the variety were here.

Mingling around, any pilot would have come across something a bit different- unlike the yacht parties of tomorrow, this was formal wear, champagne and a post-dinner function, suits and dresses a must. Every piece of this screamed elegance, and unlike tomorrow, plus ones weren’t really on the list. Not unless you were royalty, either Albert II’s descendants or literally Helena Starcross, who had been in attendance and spoken a bit about the history of it with the Prince and in particular, his rally-driver daughter as part of the evening’s entertainment.

Quite a place, and no sponsors were in sight, it felt just like a ball that had a strong smell of biofuel from the pilots here, after practice, hosted now in the late afternoon and near sunset glow. This was for them, and a pure mingling site, with even a few Junior AG pilots in attendance among the legends of the sport. The lap, on the traditional Circuit de Monaco had a big corkscrew-like hairpin with MAG tracking after the tunnel section (side-stepped with MAG tracking due to the ships scraping the roof in 2082)- the only overtaking zone outside of something insane like Sainte Devote or the hairpins. You would have to be borderline psychotic to overtake there.
But it wasn’t impossible.

Monaco always had surprises, but the glamour, the absolute peak of the opulence of it, from the cars, jewels, clothing and feeling, was on display here.

[hr]
Wondering over, Harrison found the sight of Bea, Harrison dressed up smart with a black tuxedo and bowtie, embracing his cheekie-chappy personality as ever, even in total formality.

“Hey hey, superstar! You are doing numbers on socials right now, you know?” The Aussie cheerfully smiled, knowing he'd kept up a good relation with Bea since. Then again, not many people really hated Harrison. Even Amy, for all her faults, still had a playful rivalry that wasn't borderline murderous.

“Italy was amazing. I was going to say, after that, my phone is ringing off the hook, and bloody hell, it even convinced Owen to go easy on me with risky stuff. You seem to be the common denominator for all this thing on the grid, you know….” Harrison asked, knowing more sponsor events would follow. And Bea was positioned for that. Her and the team were spending big here on sponsorship features, press and so on. Maybe it would mess with her race training time, but Carrera were clearly making a statement in Monaco, perhaps as much as the other big teams were. And Harrison just wanted to make sure he was around a cut of it.

[hr]

Amy on the other hand, had found Han, a rather unconventional pairing, but the conversation had seemingly brought them together here, as the silver-dressed, blonde hair having, diamond earring-lobed champion breaking the ice that was the Zygon pilot, glass of Prosecco in hand.

“Hey, Han. Pleasure to meet you. I suppose I did not introduce myself very well outside of our antics on track.” Amy’s fluent Korean came without the use of an Earworm, given her own origins- her mother being from Busan had given her the half-Korean side to her British origins. "Perfect in every way. Your face up on billboards. I know how that feels. And the future to come.” Amy chuckled, shaking her head, looking across to Cassie, who was chatting with Kofi at the moment.

“I suppose it is tricky having an outsider in the team. I had it with Cole Marnier, right before he retired at Zygon. Quite the character.” Amy added, looking her up and down, getting that feeling of superiority. So Amy didn’t pretend she could outdo her. She simply just gelled into her method. Her weak spot.

“I won’t ask about how you play the politics. You’re far too smart for it. But….from someone who was in your position, I just wanted to say you are doing well. Some of them, I imagine you’ve figured out who, might not be the most competent. Between us….” Amy whispered, leaning in.

“How Jinwoo is there is beyond me, and that was back then. You’ll get better because they'll make him retire if where you are is continuing, and someone who’ll look after you properly. And you deserve that.” Amy uttered, knowing her own beef with the TP back in the day- and sensing that she could be blunt with Han here. She was of Zygon in years past, after all, and knew how the machinery on the inside worked. She hadn’t been cast far from it.

[hr]

And last, a certain Helena Starcross, in much the same black dress as earlier followed alongside Dorian, who she had been chatting to. A friend from a while ago, and given she’d broken away from talking to the literal Prince of Monaco, who was in amongst the crowd.

“Ah, there you are, Paul, this is Ms Starcross. This is my team-mate.” Dorian beamed, knowing it was more likely than not Paul would be a little starstruck by this.

“Oh please, call me Helena. Good to meet you. I remember seeing your father race when I was a pundit. He was so good. Looks like you’re living up to him from what I read. It’s a pleasure.” Helena seemed contemplative, comparatively, slow, but her Northern accent and her PR-groomed charm had given back to her original playful self, humble yet regal. She had no neural link, but that handshake she gave Paul would send a feeling that he was talking to someone significantly older than him, almost four times his age. She was older than Mabel which you could tell in the little details beyond her skin and body that had been kept incredible well in shape. Helena seemed like she was moving around completely normally, fit and healthy of mind even- like decades hadn’t mattered.

“Paul, Helena says she wanted to do a piece with you on the ship’s design. On heritage. Would you like to help her out with this tomorrow after qualifying? It may take up a bit of time from the party, but if not, I am sure it will be fine.” Dorian nodded, as Helena chuckled, shrugging.

“Well, it is no bother. I would come to the party but I can tell you, my days of that are over. Back in my day though….we didn’t have those tools for removing alcohol from blood. You had to just deal with it!” Helena chuckled, her mind as sharp as ever, for an octogenarian still going strong.

In that conversation, Helena seemed like a beacon- and anyone could chat to her, or make introductions. No doubt they would recognise her, and whilst many debates about the best pilot or driver existed, in modern history, on pure stats alone, Starcross was that perfect peak. She'd be welcome to talk to them. Not often you got a chance to meet F1 royalty...

[hr]
[center][h1][b]
Before Qualifying

Café Villeneuve, Monaco
Friday, June 2nd, 2094
0950 EST
[/b][/h1][/center]

[color=gold][center][h2][i][b]The High Life[/b][/i][/h2][/center][/color]

[img]https://static.tickets-platform.com/img/pages/81/2121/31808/content/1/mosaic-66cda23445586-3470.jpg[/img]

[b]Soundtrack: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAKX51r7erw]Portishead- Glory Box[/url]
[/b]

The interview was during the morning light, with Aurora herself dressed up nicely given the presenting that was required for various media outlets later, taking a seat inside the Café Villeneuve, yes, named after a particular Canadian driver, but it had a relevant French connection. With this particular part of Monaco, that meant it sat barely at the water’s edge given the one meter of global sea rise, now seemed almost on level with it at the floor. At Sainte Devote, corner one, it had a view of the hill and the harbour behind.

The café had been closed off, with the tables rearranged for Delta Hyper, and the limited filming crew, no screen behind hiding anything but clever continuity tricks in place to make it feel as if it was. Cups of strong-smelling coffee and tea were on offer, as were French pastries and goodies. It was incredible, if a French café was your charm.

The floors were a beautiful marble, the sound of a gramophone could be heard in the lobby, and the building itself felt absolutely chiselled into history, albeit with modern touches bringing the décor from the 1700s to the 2090s. On this Riviera, Monaco was tucked into a part of France that felt almost like Miami, but without any of the Vice, instead bringing true, timeless class and architecture to bear.

[hr]

The first guest was in frame, as Aurora smiled, making introductions, before going straight into it. The son of Mr Monaco himself, Paul Mulder, in his team colours. 
[b]“Paul, welcome to Delta Hyper. We hear this is a circuit you have been looking forward to for a while. Would you like to tell us more about your livery on your ships this weekend, and what it means to you as a dedication to your father?”
[/b]

[hr]

Next up, the bouncy Brit in her rainbow-like Carrera colours.
[b]“Welcome back, Bea. How would you say you’re dealing with the glamour of Monte-Carlo, and how does it compare to the launch of the WRC at Casino Square? Do you think you’ll catch up with Daniel Ogier this weekend, who’s popped down to see a race at his home?”[/b]

[hr]
The next guest needed no introduction, in the café overlook and while teetotal and not able to enjoy the traditional fruits of this party on the sea, was here for other reasons- to find a way to win.
[b]“Kais, welcome to Monaco, and back to Earth! With everything that happened on Luna, how do you and Layla find the comparison here in the bustling, manic streets of Monaco?”[/b]

[hr]

Onto Han next, who was back to the sofa too.
[b]“Han, welcome on Delta Hyper! With your recent momentum in previous weeks, how do you feel about the fight with Valkyrie so far in the championship?”[/b]

[hr]

And last but not least- the pilot nobody may have imagined would be back for this race, perhaps let alone until after the Season Break, was sitting in the chair, in her Southern Cross colours.
[b]“Nora, it’s wonderful to have you here. Your crash was a real horror one, and we are all hugely grateful to have you here. I think many are surprised you came back so fast, but we know how important Monaco is to our pilots! How are you feeling?”[/b]